Crosby's agent discussed the possibility of Crosby joining Malkin with Mangitogorsk GM a few days ago. Magnitogorsk instead decided to give the last of the three allowed NHL slots (the other 2 going to Malkin and Gonchar) to Nikolai Kulemin (TOR). The GM Velichkin explained that (a) Kulemin grew up playing in Magnitogorsk and (b) a lot of paperwork will be associated with bringing any foreigner to Russia (visas, insurance), whereas Kulemin can join the team at the end of this week. Just in case the lockout does not last the whole season, Magnitogorsk simply wanted to maximize the impact of the additions now.

So, according to Czech media, NHL so far has not approved any transfer cards for the NHLers wanting to play in Europe. They confirmed the requests, but so far, they have been just sitting on it. Apparently, the approval can be done in a matter of minutes and sent back to IIHF in Switzerland, but it's possible that the NHL just decided to stick it to the players. Based on what I heard, they can be sitting on the transfer cards until this weekend.

Meanwhile, the "02" Arena in Prague just sold out (~18,000 tickets) for the Wednesday's game of Kladno (Jagr, Plekanec, Tlusty, Zidlicky) against Slavia Prague (Sobotka, Cervenka). Without the NHLers, such a game would draw barely 1/4 of the capacity. If the transfer cards are not confirmed by tomorrow PM, people will be piiiiised...

penny lane wrote:Did I read that AK BARs is not taking NHL'ers? Otherwise Sid could go and scout Aleskey Morozov! just teasing on this utterly dismal day in pgh.

You are right. Datsyuk and Yemelin wanted to play for them, but Kazan rejected them.